stop
/stäp/
verb
1. (of an event, action, or process) come to an end; cease to happen
2. cause (an action, process, or event) to come to an end
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Katie wrote the word, pronunciation, part of speech, and two definitions on the blank piece of notebook paper, page thirty-seven of her Honors English 11 notebook to be exact. Moments like this proved just how useful her nights of staying in to memorize Google definitions truly were.
She wished they were useless.
Her parents were screaming again. Maybe they were fighting; maybe they were holding a conversation. The point was their volume was making their eldest child shake. Slowly, she set down the pen in her hand, closed her eyes, and zeroed in on their "conversation."
Business plan/change the channel/where'd the dog go/help Dave with his homework/not enough money to send Katie to college/why doesn't she leave her room anymore/why aren't there any dishes clean/why isn't the laundry done/I told you/no you didn't/white noise/panic attack.
Katie shoved her index fingers into her ears to drown their voices out. It didn't work completely, but it worked enough. She could hear her heart thud in her chest, feel its beat on her thumbs from the undersides of her earlobes. She should have been taking deep breaths, that's what she read online, but her brain wasn't cooperating with her body right now.
She should have called someone but she had no one. Maddie wasn't her friend anymore. Sophie wasn't her friend anymore by association. Mia was a psycho whom she'd betrayed. Diego was dating Maddie, and Katie hated him, anyway, probably because she didn't hate him at all. She wasn't friends with Emma or Andi. Jax hated her because of Maddie. She'd never been close with Daniel.
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a·lone
/əˈlōn/
adjective & adverb
1. having no one else present; on one's own
· · ·
Suddenly, she became disgusted with herself. Katie grabbed her notebook and flung it across the room. Nerd, Maddie would say. This is what her life had been reduced to: writing down fricken Google definitions in a notebook for comfort! She grabbed the second closest object—her phone which never went off anymore—and threw it at the wall as hard as she could. Infuriatingly enough, it didn't break.
Katie grabbed a pillow and screamed into it until her throat ached. Who when what where why how. How had her life been reduced to this. Why had it happened. When had it happened. What was she supposed to do now. Where was she supposed to go. Who cared.
Questions/statements/meaningless words shouted in her brain, locked inside of her, no way out. No way out no way out neverawayout.
Had she been a terrible person? Was she really so evil she deserved this torture? Surely there were worse souls in Miami/Florida/the United States/the world. Certainly she wasn't the worst person alive.
But then why was it other people had options? Other people weren't terrified for their future? Maddie was a bitch (the Diego Effect her ass) and look at how fabulous her life was! Maddie would never need a job or a college education. Maddie didn't even need to graduate high school, really. Add together her mom's money and her dad's child support checks and her boyfriend's pizza company owning family and Maddie was set. Even if she had none of that, she could just cast a spell and bam she had a job or ten thousand dollars.
Katie was smart but that was it. She was good at school and she was good at memorizing things. Her memory was a curse, not a blessing. Who would want to remember every terrible thing that had ever happened to her, never able to forget?
Sometimes she wished she was one of those rebellious kids, the kinds who were into underage drinking and drug abuse and things that would require any fricken boy on the planet to find her even semi-attractive. Just to forget, to belong to something. That's all she'd ever wanted with the Panthers: to belong to something. Well, and what she'd convinced herself at the time was friendship. But no. That kind of personality wasn't wired into her. She wasn't an athlete; she failed as a Goth; she'd been banished from being a Panther. She has nothing/no one/heart in her throat/can't breathe/help.
She didn't even cry anymore. She used to, thought somehow it would help. Sometimes it felt good, which probably explained why she didn't do it anymore. These days she didn't feel anything and her body retaliated by immersing itself in fear and anxiety and terror and panic. If she was so smart, why couldn't she make it stop?
Her parents had stopped yelling, who knew how long ago. Katie swallowed, stalked across her bedroom, and opened the door. She walked to her bathroom, stripped, cranked the shower water hot, and stepped inside. The self-made sauna matted her curls into a long straight dripping sheet. She closed her eyes and let the water warm her up externally.
It was the nicest physical sensation she could get these days.
Her heart still thought she was on a battlefield. It would not calm down no matter how much she begged it to. It was terrifying, having no control over her body.
Katie glanced up at the ceiling, but that wasn't really where she was looking. She was looking toward Heaven.
Her dad's side was Catholic. Her mom's side was Christian. And Katie? She had no idea what she was.
No, that wasn't true. Confused. Confused is what Katie was. Confused and lost and scared and alone.
She didn't know what it was, maybe her desperation or her fear of the rest of her life being exactly like this or the fact that she couldn't picture her life past high school, period, but something made her open her mouth and speak. Something made her open her mouth and pour out every ounce of her breaking, thudding heart to God, even though she wasn't sure He was listening because it wasn't like anyone else ever did. Every anger, every hurt, every fear, everysinglething inside of her erupted as word vomit to the heavens above. Katie almost resented herself for hoping she was being heard because she'd seen where hope got her so many times before.
But she did hope. She knew because her heartbeat finally slowed. She knew because her heart was hovering in her chest, swelling and pleading.
She knew because she was crying.
Teeth chattering, Katie shut off her shower water and sniffled. She didn't really know how to close this prayer/rant/thing so she went with something she knew well: desperation.
"Please… please fix it."
She took her time that night, drying off her body, getting into her pajamas, drying her hair. She was in no rush. It was early when she climbed into bed, only a little past nine. Katie shut off her lamp and let her head hit the pillow, her breath coming slowly and calmly. Calmly. Her body wasn't on fire, which was a nice surprise. She didn't think about her crumpled notebook or thrown phone or the homework she hadn't been able to figure out. She didn't think about anything.
She only let herself drift off to sleep.