Riley looked at her reflection in the mirror. She had barely eaten anything in weeks, and her weight was steadily decreasing. She hated every inch of her body and lived by the mantra, "Hunger hurts, but starving works." She felt as if she didn't deserve food because she just wasn't worth it, like she had never been worth it. Although she was never able to any of her friends, one of her tumblr followers had sent her a link to a website about people starving themselves on purpose after they saw she had posted something about wanting to lose a little bit of weight. She looked through the pictures and at first, she was confused. "Why would people do this?" she thought to herself. But as the days went on, she kept coming back to the website. And slowly, but surely, she started to follow the advice the different people would leave on the website. It was like she was addicted to the thin bodies the website produced. And she was even more addicted to her empty stomach and the slowly decreasing number on the scale. Her friends had talked about how crazy her diet was that day, but she didn't let those comments get to her. Because Riley would be the skinniest person she knew, no matter what it took. What she didn't know was that her parents had noticed how ungodly skinny she had become and were growing more and more concerned by each day. And that was the day that they had had enough.

Maya sighed as she got home from school. She was pretty sure her mom was working a double shift today to earn some extra cash. She immediately went to her room and closed and locked her door. Then, she went to her underwear drawer and dug through it until she found it: her favorite razor blade. It was sharp enough that it still made her bleed a lot, and she kept it clean. It had been a long, stressful day at school. She had failed her math test and hated herself for it. She was a failure like she always knew she was. That's why her dad left her. That's why her mom was never home. That's why all her friends seemed distant lately. She was a miserable failure and no one would ever love her. So she grabbed her razor blade, sat down on her bed, rolled up her sleeve, and dug the blade into her skin. Not just once or twice, but five times. Pretty soon, breathed a sigh of relief at the site of the blood as it trickled down her arm. She started to feel her eyes flutter. And soon, she was passed out on her bed, blood pouring out of her arm, not hearing her mother scream her name as she came in the door.

Farkle had started to have nightmares again. An old man was coming into his room and touching him and he would wake up in a cold sweat before anything that bad happened. These dreams were becoming too much so he decided to start taking an extra pain killer his mom had from back surgery. The pills ran out soon enough though, so he started to find people selling the pills he liked after school in the back alleys. After a while, he became addicted to them, and if he didn't have them, he would snap at people. He was becoming angrier and more petulant by the day. His parents were concerned about his behavior, but had no clue how bad it had gotten until one day his mother saw him snorting something on his desk. She told his father and that's when they decided it was time to get their son the help he needed.

Zay had just learned his grandmother had passed. She had been sick for a while, and he knew it was coming. Still, it hurt him deep down inside. His grandmother had been his best friend since he was little. He loved her like a second mother and she loved him too. He started to drink to numb the pain. What started out as drinking every weekend at parties turned into coming into school wasted every other day. One day, it wasn't even 10 am, and he was so drunk, he passed out during gym class. He was taken to the nurse's office, who called an ambulance to pump his stomach because he had alcohol poisoning. Upon arriving at the hospital, he woke up groggily, not realizing where he was. Soon, everything came crashing down and he saw the look his mother gave him. He knew that he was in for it, but before he could say anything, she said, "Don't even start. Your father and I are very concerned about you. You're going to an inpatient hospital." Zay knew there was no point in fighting her on this. Because she would win. His mom always did.

The four teenagers actually had no clue the others existed, but because of the events that unfolded that day, they would soon learn a lot about each other.