Numb

I've become so numb I can't feel you there
I've become so tired so much more aware
I'm becoming this all I want to do
Is be more like me and be less like you

Ellie shut the front door, pulled back the curtains, and watched Sean walk home. She breathed out slowly and turned around. There stood Judy in an unconcealed drunken state stumbling towards the front door. Her hair a disheveled mess, her eyes sunken, and sallow, a bottle of vodka gripped tightly in her hand. Judy tripped over her feet and grabbed onto the bottom banister of the stairs, dropping her bottle of vodka and watching it shatter on the floor. "Look what you made me do," she slurred slipping towards the floor and fumbling her hands to collect the alcohol-soaked pieces of glass.

Ellie was silent. Ellie bent down, picked up her mother, and dragged her back to the couch. The entire time her mother struggled against her. The struggle ended in the living room where her mother collapsed on the couch and passed out. Ellie just bent down towards the floor, leaned her back against the side of the couch, and just stared at the wall across from her. She looked over towards the shattered vodka bottle, the shards glistening in the dim foyer light. Ellie crawled over and gently picked up the broken shards and held them in her hand and carried them cautiously to the kitchen garbage can where she brushed them into the trash. Suddenly she felt a tiny prick. Ellie looked down to see one of the shards had cut her hand.

The pain of the glass cutting the palm of her hand didn't even faze her as she walked upstairs and sat down on the floor of her room just staring at her bleeding hand. It took a few moments of sitting on the floor in silence as the blood pumped out of the cut before she got up and shuffled to the bathroom to fumble through the medicine cabinet for some peroxide and poured it generously over her hand. She watched it bubble and shivered as the cold liquid stung as it cleaned out the cut. The cut spanned across her palm and she couldn't make a band-aide work so she pressed some clean gauze pads against it and wrapped it with medical tape.

She quietly walked back to her room and changed into some sweats for bed. Ellie grabbed her portable CD player and slipped the headphones over her ears, climbing into bed. She pressed play she drowned her thoughts into the sounds of Chevelle, Send the Pain Below. Rolling on her side as she slipped between the covers she hugged her pillow tight as she mouthed the words to the song as she fell asleep.

I liked having hurt,
So send the pain below where I need it,
You used to beg me to take care of things,
And smile at the thought of me failing.

But long before, having hurt,
I'd send the pain below,
I'd send the pain below.

Much like suffocating

That sleep didn't last long as she tossed and turned through the night. It felt like her eyes had only be closed for a few minutes when her alarm began to blare. Groggily she threw her feet over the edge of the bed and dragged herself to the bathroom where she gently pulled the gauze away from her palm and peaked at the cut from the night before. It looked okay and looked to have closed itself up enough for her to take a quick shower to wake up. Ellie realized shortly into her shower it was going to be a day. She dropped the conditioner bottle on her foot, got shampoo in her eyes, her hairdryer gave up halfway through drying her hair and she ended up just throwing it into a ponytail. She ran out of eyeliner and ended up just putting on mascara and made an attempt to cover the dark circles under her eyes and eventually just gave up. She wrapped up her hand again and rushed back to her room.

When she got back to her room she realized she maybe had 20 minutes before she had to leave for school and threw on the easiest outfit she had of ripped jeans and a long-sleeved t-shirt. Knowing the day she was having she made sure her homework was in her bookbag when she carried her it downstairs, glanced at her mother on the couch as she walked into the kitchen to grab a pop-tart for breakfast before rushing herself out the door.


Sean dug his hands deep into his hoodie pocket, gently running his fingers along the outline of the CD Ellie had lent him. He'd never heard of Jamison Parker before she'd given him that CD and it was definitely not his usual genre of music. He was used to rap and hip hop; Nas, Eminem, Tupac, and Biggie. But he was always a sucker for good lyrics. It's what kept him clocked into the music last night and this morning as he listened to the CD again on the way to school. He remembered being introduced to Linkin Park and finding something special in the combination of rap and metal. The stuff Ellie listened to was different, Ellie was different. He easily connected so some fo the music she shared with him last night.

His eyes caught a blur of red and black rushing past him towards the school doors, "El!" he called out, pulling his headphones off and grabbing the belt loops of his pants and held them up as he ran to catch up with her. "Ellie -" She turned around at the sound of her name and clutched her binder to her chest. He saw the dark circles under eyes and recognized a sleepless night on her face, "You okay?"

Ellie shrugged, "didn't sleep well last night," she yawned and covered her mouth with a bandaged hand. Sean found the yawn contagious and found himself doing the same before gently taking her bandaged hand, "oh that? My mom just dropped a bottle after you left- one of the pieces nicked me a bit."

Sean nodded and gently brought her hand to his lips and kissed it, "all better now?" he asked smirking.

Ellie laughed and pushed him away playfully. "Yea, much better," she said rolling her eyes.

"Good," Sean laughed as they walked into the school.

Paige watched cautiously as Sean and Ellie stood on the steps of the school laughing and what looked like flirting a little bit. "Hey Ash" Paige called as she stepped out of Dylan's car and caught up with her.

" Yea Paige?" Ashley asked as she fixed her short choppy hair.

"I could need an optometrist appointment but I'm pretty sure that's Ellie and ..."

"Is that Sean Cameron?" Ashley asked.

"And I'm 99% sure he kissed her hand and it looked like there was a bandage on it."

"I noticed that..." Ashley said softly. The two girls were never fully licensed in friendship again, but they'd been bonding. Things between them had softened up since Paige confessed to Ashley about having been raped. And now with current events where Ellie was concerned - they'd been watching out for her. Thinking, with the purest of intentions that their overprotective behavior was for the best. They just didn't realize that, while they thought they were helping, they were really smothering their friend.

" Maybe we should talk to her about it..." Ashley suggested, "but after yesterday she'll just think we're ganging up on her again."

" ...And tell her how hanging out with Sean can ruin her rep" Paige said applying a layer of pink lip gloss to her lips. Ashley rolled her eyes. "It's true, hanging out with a known delinquent will not do her any favors."

"Sean is not that bad," Ashley argued and rushed to keep up with Paige.

"Hey El," Paige said smiling as she cornered her at her locker.

"Hey Paige," Ellie responded and smiled goodbye to Sean who walked down the hall to his locker.

"Sorry about yesterday," Ash said.

"It's fine," Ellie said, "I was just frustrated that my friends couldn't trust me."

Ashley looked guilty, "I didn'..."

"I know," she answered, "I'm sorry for snapping."

"So what happened to your hand?" Paige interrupted.

"Not that it's any of your business, but it was an accident," Ellie said, "so don't worry, it wasn't on purpose."

Paige looked like she was ready to make a stink of her answer, but Ashley nudged her. Paige shrugged her off, "Sorry for caring," Paige grumbled and walked away.

"Okay," Ashley answered, not believing a word of it, "hey there's Craig, I'll see you at lunch, okay?"

"Sure..." Ellie said rolling her eyes, and watched as Ashley ran over to Craig. She turned back to her locker and swapped her binder for some notebooks and watched Marco creep up behind her in her locker mirror. Ellie smiled as he covered her eyes with his hands and heard his voice.

"Guess Who!" he smiled.

"Um, could it be Mr. Marco del Rossi?" she asked smiling.

Marco dropped his hands and frowned, "You're no fun El."

"Oh, you know me - I just suck the fun out of everything," she laughed to herself.

"That's not what I meant," he said, "and you know it."

Ellie laughed and glanced down the hall at Sean at his locker and caught his gaze before hiding back in her locker.

"Did you finish your geometry homework?" Marco asked.

"Yea," she answered, "with a bit of help," she blushed.

Marco nudged her as she glanced down the hall at Sean again and then back at Marco. "Does this have anything to do with the little interaction I caught between you and Sean yesterday in the zen garden?"

Ellie's eyes widened, "shh."

"What is it a secret?" Marco asked, "he's cute. you're cute."

"We're just friends."

Marco nodded, "uh, yea sure, El."

Ellie turned red as Marco pressed her for details, and slammed her locker shut. "Look," she said, "I may have mentioned I was struggling with geometry, and he may have come over and helped me with my homework and hung out and listened to music with me, that's it."

Marco smiled, "Oh I know there's more to that and I will get it out of you missy."

Ellie rolled her eyes and they started down the hall towards homeroom.


Jay sauntered up to Sean's locker and leaned against the neighboring locker staring until he could get Sean's attention.

"I see you Jay," he said as he glanced down to the opposite end of the hall and found Ellie smiling at him and then looking back into her locker.

Jay watched him closely and caught his gaze, and even caught the smile Ellie was flashing him, "so what's with you and the vampire princess?"

"Don't," Sean said annoyed.

"Fine... but,"

"But what?"

"Saturday - having a little get together with the crew while my parents are gone."

"I'll see what I can do," Sean said.

"See," Jay said shutting Sean's locker on him and towering over him. He tightened the drawstring on Sean's hoodie and carefully tried to make eye contact. Sean stood there silently. "I let you in... I expect a little bit of respect," he clarified, "and that includes showing up when you're invited."

Sean stared at him before brushing his hands away from him, "I'll think about it," Sean said changing his tune as he stood up to Jay.

"Saturday Sean," Jay repeated as he walked away.

Sean looked back down the hallway to where Ellie and Marco had stood and had seen they had gone. He tightened the strap of his bookbag and clenched his jaw as he headed to homeroom and unexpectedly bumped into Ellie, and felt her slip something into his pocket. He smiled for a moment and she disappeared as quickly as she had run into him. When he got to homeroom he dropped his bag on the floor and reached into his pocket and pulled out a piece of paper and unfolded it.

Sean

Thank you.

Ellie

Sean folded up the note, slipped it back into his pocket with a smile on his face. Thank you. Thank you. Thank you. He couldn't seem to concentrate on anything else as he tapped his pencil on the desk with a glazed look on his face as he listened to morning announcements. He hadn't even noticed that Emma was watching him curiously as he smiled to himself.

Thank You.

Thank You.

Thank You.

He hadn't even done anything.

Emma continued to watch because she had never seen Sean look like that before. She was used to the constant brooding and self-loathing that he exuded. She was used to the Sean that didn't really show much emotion, and there he sat in homeroom with this happy glow. And she watched as he kept pulling a note out of his pocket and reading it over and over and tucking it away in his pocket and smiling again. What could possibly be on that note?

Author's Note: updated 06-30-2020