Adam stared at his arm, where the marks were from a few months ago. Before the chaos happened. Before his own little hell got a glimpse of heaven.
Before he met her.
Well, not just met. They grew up going to the same school, but before he really got to know her. For the first time in a long time, he had hope. What started as a random handout being given to him to attend a meeting for the reading club became a moment Adam would never forget. Belle was just so kind and smart; it hurt when the jocks would hit on her just for her looks. Adam knew that if she had an appearance of silver, there was also a heart of gold.
The one invitation led to them being paired up for projects throughout the school year. Together, Belle and Adam brought smiles to everyone from little children in the elementary schools to senior citizens in nursing homes. The more events they read at, the more Adam wanted to spend time with Belle. He felt so much joy, the razor disappeared. He knew Belle had noticed the scars, and she seemed tentative at first, but it appeared that she saw the person behind the scars.
But the final time reading for others for the year had occurred, and Adam knew he and Belle would grow apart again. His heart hurt at the thought, though he knew from the beginning this day would come. Tears came to his eyes, but he would not let them fall. He would not let them fall.
Without thinking about it, Adam got ready to go to bed, though he knew no sleeping would take place in his bed. He brushed his teeth and took his medication, only paying enough attention to know it got done. Still, he wondered, why bother?
As he placed the bottle of pills back in the cabinet, his knuckles bumped something out of place. He looked in the cabinet to see a shaving razor. Images flashed in Adam's head of what he could do. He could turn the blade the wrong way and slide it across his body. He could feel the pain leaving his body with the blood, only leaving the numbness he felt so many times before. He could even do it toward the back of his neck, where no one would see it, and if by some strange occurrence someone did see, he could claim the razor slipped while he was shaving.
Adam just held the razor in his hand. For ten minutes that seemed like an eternity, he stood there. He was finally brought out of his daze by his brother, Luther, knocking on the bathroom door and yelling at him. "Hey, Prince! You know, other people need this bathroom before they can get their beauty sleep." Shaking his head, Adam placed the razor back in the cabinet. As he climbed into bed, contrary to his expectations, sleep did come, but the only dreams soon became nightmares.
The next morning, Adam returned to his stance of pondering. The razor felt strangely comforting in his hands. This time, his thoughts were interrupted by another brother of his, Connor. "Come on, Adam! You can't look like that much of a beast. Hurry up! You better not make me late. It looks bad for the student council president to be late." Once again, the razor was returned to the shelf unused.
As Adam sat down to breakfast, the boys' mother set a bowl of cereal in front of him. Across the table, Adam's younger brother, Chip finished his cereal. Adam only stirred his cereal, unable to find the motivation to bring the spoon to his mouth. Chip took his dishes to the sink and filled them with water to soak. As he sat back down, he asked, "Hey Adam, when are you and Belle going to read to my class again?"
Adam sneered and with a slight growl to his voice answered, "Never."
Chip, only slightly scared, inquired, "Are you sure? Never is an awfully long time." Adam just stared at his breakfast. Chip tried to distract himself with other things from the room, but couldn't help but mention, "You know, I really think she likes you."
Adam stood up, furious. "How could you possibly tell? You saw us together for maybe ten minutes. And you're just a kid. How would you even know about this sort of thing?"
"Because of how she looked at you." Adam calmed down, waiting for more of an explanation from Chip. "The way she looked at you reminded me of the pictures of Mama and Papa on their wedding day. I thought I saw you looking at her the same way. Were you?"
Adam turned away, embarrassed to face his younger brother. "I never saw her look at me like that."
Chip rolled his eyes at the stupidity of his older brother. "Of course you didn't see it. When she would look at you, you turned away. When you looked at her, she turned away. If you two would just hold your heads still for five seconds, we wouldn't be having this conversation."
Adam wanted to ask more, but a car horn came from outside, signaling their mother being ready to take the boys to school. Adam dropped his dishes off in the sink on the way out. He stayed silent throughout the entire ride, thinking about what Chip said.
The moment he got out at school, he saw Belle. She looked beautiful as usual as she read her favorite book. She looked up from her book, and out of habit, Adam suddenly became very interested with one of the tiles on the wall. Still, for the one nanosecond of reaction time, Adam noticed that Belle was indeed turning to look at him. At least he thought. He turned back to look at her, and she was once more engrossed in her book.
The warmth returned to Adam's heart. The razor was long forgotten and would long remain forgotten. Hope returned and bloomed like a beautiful red rose.