TRIGGER WARNING: LIKE A HUGE ONE!
WARNING: SELF HARM
Just a warning about this chapter, IF YOU WANT TO SKIP THIS CHAPTER BECAUSE IT'S NOT A NICE AS MY OTHER CHAPTERS THEN GO AHEAD, I WOULDN'T BLAME YOU. If you read this and get triggered, don't say I didn't warn you! Just to point out: I DON'T NOT CONDONE SELF HARM! I understand that it's people's choice but I do not agree with it.
PLEASE SKIP IF YOU ARE NOT COMFORTABLE WITH ANY OF THIS
Ever since Mal had been on the Isle she had always been pressured, by her mother or by the people of the Isle to be the evilest that she can be. She never had any time to herself, no release of all the built-up pain that her mother caused her, all the pain that the people of the Isle had caused her. Every day was a struggle for Mal, a struggle to put a wicked smile on her face, a struggle to make sure her friends didn't see through her mask. Mal needed a release and magic wasn't even a possibility, Mal terrorized the people of the Isle but it wasn't enough. Stealing didn't quite cut it either until one night while Mal was terrorizing some local kids, Mal passed a dark alleyway with a small glint in. Mal stopped running after the kids and walked over to the alley.
The closer she got to the glint, the brighter it got as it reflected off the moonlight. Mal stared down at this mysterious object and began to reach down to touch it. As her palm of her hand reached closer to the ground to pick it up, Mal felt a prick on her skin. She quickly retracted her hand only to find that whatever the object was had cut her palm open. Mal didn't wince in pain or cry, all she did was stare at her hand, Mal didn't understand. The cut didn't cause her any pain, in fact, it took away some of the pain that everyone had caused. Mal reached back down, carefully, and picked up the object to see that it was a shard of a mirror. A small smile crept its way up to her face, she knew at that moment that the mirror shard was her release, not magic or terrorisation. She placed the mirror shard into her purple jacket pocket and made her way back to Bargain Castle.
Her mother was currently out of the castle, probably visiting Evil Queen like she usually does, so Mal took this as an opportunity to see if her theory was correct. She ran up the stairs and into her bedroom. It wasn't particularly big but the walls and roof were covered in black mold, her bookshelf was scratched bare and her armchair by the window that was once purple was now black with dirt. Mal slid onto her creaking bed and pulled the shard out of her pocket and placed in the palm that wasn't bleeding. Mal took the blade and began marking out in her head of where she would cut. She needed her legs to run away from angry vendors that she stole from, she needed her stomach to be as healed as possible so her next beating from her mother wouldn't be as painful. She needed the back of her legs so she could hide better from angry Islanders and her mother. The last place Mal thought of was her wrists. Mal decided that this was the best place as she didn't need her wrists as much on the Isle.
Mal rolled up the sleeve of the arm of her still bleeding palm. She rolled the jacket all the way back to her elbow and made sure that it was secure. Mal began to test her theory as she placed the shard at the top of her wrist by her elbow and added pressure as she slid the somewhat dirty shard across her wrist. The further she moved the blade, the larger the cut grew, which meant more pain went away. As she removed the blade from her skin she noticed that the pain inside her numbed. Something felt different inside Mal and it wasn't a bad different. Again, she took the shard and lined it up next to the bleeding cut on her wrist and applied more pressure to deepen the wound.
All Mal's pain was slowly beginning to slip away with every cut she made. This went on for another five minutes until her old bed sheets were drenched in blood from her wrists. The cuts had now expanded down from her left arm to her right arm. Both wrists were bleeding profusely. Some of her starting cut were slowly beginning to heal. Mal checked the cracked clock in her room to find that she had three minutes before her mother returned. Mal hid the mirror shard inside her bedside table and grabbed old clothes from her wardrobe and ripped pieces of cloth off to wrap around her wrists. Mal gripped the bedsheets from her bed and hid them in the back of her wardrobe. While cleaning up Mal noticed spots of blood on her pants but took no notice of them. As Mal turned around to her opening door, her mother appeared ready to teach Mal a lesson. It was lessons like those that encouraged Mal to keep cutting.
But it's been a while since she last did it, now she was in Auradon with her best friends, Loving boyfriend, and his loving Parents. She was away from her mother and the Isle, nothing anyone did could make Mal revert to her old ways. That's what Mal thought until she and the other VK's attended one of Ben's Kingdom Tours. King Ben had decided to invite the Vk's to Charmington, he wanted to show them around the United States of Auradon, the kingdom that all four of them saved at his coronation.
Charmington decided to throw a party in honor of the King and his guests. There were blue streamers dangling from the ceiling, light up balloons were stuck on the large buffet table and in the corners of the room. The party was in full swing, Mal and Ben danced through most of the night with Carlos, Evie, and Jay by their sides. All night the rulers of Charmington were sat on their thrones in the middle of the stage, watching the party in full swing. Ben pulled Mal close to him, gripped her waist and pointed to the couple on their thrones, he leant down and whispered "One day, that will be us, that much I can promise" Mal started to blush like there was no tomorrow as Ben decided that now a perfect time to hold her close and kiss her deeply n her dark plump lips. As they pulled away they noticed that the couple on the thrones were watching them in awe. Mal and Ben danced for a while until Mal needed to pop to the bathrooms. They shared one kiss before she departed.
When Mal walked through the doors of the female bathrooms, she was hit with a scent of lavender while the bright blue room burned her eyes. Mal made her way to the end stall and did what she had to do. Once she was finished she was about to unlock the stall door but stopped when she heard voices of some very obnoxious girls who were trying to flirt with Ben at the start of the night.
"Why did the King have to pick her? she's nothing!" one girl said.
"Did you see what she was wearing, and don't even get me started on when they were kissing half an hour ago." Another girl said.
"Was her mother even real anyway? The king pities her for the abuse but is there any? Like, I can't see any scars?" the first girl asks.
"the only thing abusive round here is her pale ass skin!" the second girl mentioned
"I swear if someone doesn't teach her a lesson about steal someone's man, then I will!" Mal knew that voice like she knew the back of her hand, Audrey. "Come one let's go, I have a king to go and win back"
Teach her a lesson
Those four words rang through Mal's head over and over again, each word causing more pain than the last. Questions ran through Mal's head Does he pity me? Have they ever seen the amount of pain my mother put me through? Was this all a mistake? Flashbacks flew through Mal's head, back to the day that all the pain had started and the way she chose to end it. Mal knew that it was the wrong path to do down but it made her feel safe. Slowly Mal unlocked the door and walked out of the stall and out of the bathroom. She walked back into the ballroom to find Ben but she couldn't see him anywhere. He was probably talking to other council members. Mal decided that Evie was her next best option. She walked over to the Buffet table to find Evie chatting up a prince from another state of Auradon. I tapped on Evie's shoulder and signaled Evie over to the corner of the room for a quick private talk. Evie excused herself and then Mal dragged her to the corner. "E, I'm going to head up to my room, I'm not feeling too good, it must be all the food and dancing. If Ben comes looking for me could you tell him that I'm fine and that I've just gone to bed or something?" Mal inquired. "Of course Mal, I'll come and check on you soon" Evie replied. Mal curtseyed to Evie and Evie did the same to Mal.
Mal made her way out of the double doors and up to several flights of stairs until she made her way to her designated room. As she opened the door, a calming wave of heat hit her face. Mal closed the door behind her and took off her heels and placed them by the door. Mal turned to her wardrobe and changed into something that she didn't mind getting dirty. Once Mal was comfy, she made her way over to her suitcase and pulled out a small box. In that box were clean rags and her shard of broken mirror that she had found on the Isle all that time ago. Mal took the shard carefully out of the box and made her way to the bathroom, she left the door slightly open so she could hear the main door. Mal placed her right wrist over the sink and began to cut jagged lines on her skin. Each line released more anger and pain from her body. Slowly she was forgetting all about what the girls said, line by line. Mal was so deep in her own thoughts that she didn't hear the main door open, but what she did hear was the gasp that the perpetrator had made. It was Ben. He came to check on Mal after Evie had told him that she wasn't well.
Ben dropped whatever he was about to say and ran to Mal. He pulled her wrist away to examine it and he was terrified. He could see each cut she had made today and all the cuts that she had made previously. Slowly he pulled Mal out of the bathroom, making sure not to hurt her, and onto her bed. Mal couldn't look Ben in the eye, she feared what he would do and say. Ben noticed this and slowly reached over Mal and pulled the rags off her nightstand and began to wrap them around her wrist. With every wrap he made, he would place a small kiss on top of it to reassure Mal that he still loved her, Cuts and all. Ben clipped the end on the rag to make sure that it would stay secured on Mal's wrist.
Still noticing that she wasn't making contact, Ben got down on one knee and sunk his head so he was looking up at Mal and she was looking down at him. "What caused this Mal?" Ben asked in an extremely calm tone as he rubbed small soothing circles on her upper thigh. "Mal, I know you think that this will change us but believe me I will always love you, no matter how tough times can get. So I need you to tell me what brought this on Mal. It helps to talk things through" Ben pleaded as he arose from his knees and back onto the bed. "Audrey and her guests were here and they all had a group meeting in the bathroom. They pretty much gave me shit for what happened in the past and who I am. I guess it just triggered something from the Isle and doing this..." Mal pointed to her arm "Made me feel safe and made me forget everything that they said. I'm sorry please don't send me back to the Isle" Mal begged through sobs. Ben pulled her close and shushed her "First I will never send you back to the Isle, even if I was forced to give up the throne, I will never let you go back. Second, Mal I know that the Isle is a bit of a touchy subject for you, but you need to talk things out. I'm always here and I'm never going away. I would walk to the end of the earth for you Mal, over and over again. I don't care if my day is filled with meetings and homework, I will drop it all for you because you mean that much to me. Third, do the others know about this?" Ben spoke while calming Mal down, making sure that she knew to come to him and not to cut her problems away. "Thank you, Ben, but I don't want you to give up all your work just for me and No, no one knows. I hid for a couple months before we came here. After we came here I never did it again, until today. I love you Ben and I know I may not tell you often but I really do" Mal's voice grew quieter as she drew on until eventually, she fell asleep in Ben's Arms. Ben slowly rocked Mal back and forth while thinking about all the help he needed to get Mal, but also all the help he needed to get Audrey, she is sick and delusional. That's how they stayed for the rest of the night, sure the party was made for the king and it was required for Ben to attend, but Mal was more important in his eyes, she will only ever be the most important thing in his life.
Again just to point out, I don't condone self-harm, but if you are struggling and need someone to talk to or someone to listen to you, I'm always down to talk.
this chapter isn't obviously like the others but I wanted to show a real world problem and how it can be resolved with help if this offended anyone then I truly am sorry but I did warn you.