Kurt had never felt quite happy with who he is. Mentally, he was above average, so he was usually satisfied with his intellectual capability. He was, of course, the best in his french class, and even the teacher had to admit that he knew far more than anyone else. It must be, be reasoned, his innate ability to absorb what he was told.
That might be why he so easily believed the insults that were thrown his way.
"Fag" and "Fairy" were his compliments on Monday. Tuesday was "faggot," accompanied by a large blue slushie. Wednesday was "homo" and "princess", followed by a red slushie on Thursday, in addition to a particularly hard shove into the lockers.
By the time Friday rolled around, Kurt had been pretty fucking sick of McKinley High. Sick of high school, and sick if his life. His father didn't know what to do with him, since they couldn't bond over sports or girls. Luckily for Burt, Finn now had that role. Carole was always very sweet, but she just wasn't his mother, and she never would be. Kurt knew he had a decent home life. He had no excuse for feeling so sad. Pathetic. So, that night, once he got home from school, he slammed his backpack down on the table and rushed upstairs. He quickly got out his laptop and set it on the bed, not caring about the open door because no one else was home. Burt was working late at the tire shop, and Carol was still at the hospital. Fingers moving furiously, Kurt typed into the google search bar.
ways to cope with emotional pain
Because that's what he figured it was. When he really got down to it, at the end of the day, it wasn't the bruises or the cold slushies that mattered- it was how he felt.
He was constantly on the lookout, terrified that the jocks would be waiting around every corner, ready to hit him or throw him in a dumpster as they had the previous week.
And the week before.
And the week before.
And the week before that.
The stress was killing him.
Not only that, but he also began to believe the insults they threw at him. He knew they were pathetic and not very creative, but it was hard to hold that mindset after months and months of hearing about how worthless he was, how pathetic, how disgusting.
Maybe they were right, Kurt reasoned. No one ever told him otherwise; at least not since his mom , he even believed that her death was his punishment for being gay.
Kurt glanced at the page of results.
How to Cope with Emotional Pain on Wikihow.
Kurt clicked on it, but quickly hit the back button when he realized that it was full of worthless tips about "finding yourself" and "talking to others about it". Screw them, whoever wrote the ariticle, Kurt thought bitterly. They obviously had never been through anything worse than a breakup.
He looked at the next result. It was similar.
self esteem and heartbreak. positive thinking. How to Cope with the Loss of a Loved One.
(Kurt couldn't bear to click on that one.)
Diligently, he scrolled through all of the pages.
When he got to the eleventh page of results, he saw a question on yahoo answers. Ready to give up, he clicked on it with a sense of defeat; after all, if the last ten and a half pagers hadn't yielded any results, why would this one?
The question was asked by someone named "Lizzie_is_blonde355", and it was the same exact question he was searching for.
"How do I cope with emotional pain?"
Cause my life just really sucks and I have no friends and everybody teases me and stuff... Any ideas guys?
This girl seemed to be in exactly his situation. Filled with a new sense of hope, Kurt scrolled through all eight of the best answer, which had been chosen by voters, was something stupid like "stay true to yourself" as well as "it gets better, honey."
Kurt rolled his eyes at that.
But one answer, posted by breathing&dying236, caught his attention.
"im sorry to hear that. u could always cut urself, it makes me feel better. good luck."
Kurt stared at the screen. Of course, why hadn't he thought of it before? Tons of kids did it, right? Anyways, this answer seemed much more honest than the rest of them.
Once couldn't hurt.
He dug around in his art supplies until he found an exacto knife. His hands shook as he slid off the cover, sitting down on his bed. He pressed the sharp silver edge into his left arm.
He marveled at the feeling of pain that washed over him.
He only cut twice, and it wasn't very deep. It would heal in a few days anyway. No harm done, right?
That had been freshman year.