Chapter 5

Thalia.

My mother had come to the event. She had stumbled in, already slightly drunk. Annabeth had gone off with her parents, and Percy was still playing with her little brother. I was trying to coax Rachel to say hi to Bobby when I spotted her.

I would like to say I marched up to her. I would like to say I yelled at her and asked her why the hell she had the audacity to show up here. Why the hell she thought she had the right to show up here. To ask her why the hell she still considered herself my mother. But I didn't. I hid, like a coward. I stayed underneath the table with Rachel and prayed that they didn't see me.

It was the first time in years that I'd backed away from a fight.

They were looking for me. She started talking to Chiron, who started asking around after me. No one noticed me quietly sitting under the table. When they asked Percy, he quickly realized what was going on and played dumb. She started becoming more and more frustrated until she was making a scene. No one noticed though, because everyone was making a scene. She was, for once, not the only screaming person in the crowd.

Eventually, she left. I stilled my heavy breathing, and pretended nothing had happened. I went back to trying to calm down Rachel, and eventually trying to comfort Annabeth.

Because at this point, I was used to it. At this point, I was incapable of breaking down and sobbing like Annabeth did. I was incapable of even shedding a tear as I saw the woman that once took care of me walk out, a drunken mess, into the streets.

Percy.

We don't speak of it. Visiting day, I mean. It's only been a morning after and I already know that we don't speak of it. We don't speak of Annabeth breaking down, or Thalia's mother. Maybe, some part of me had hoped that someone would come for me. That I would have someone to make a scene with, or hide from. I don't know. It might have been fun.

With Grover mad at me, everything is getting worse. I haven't seen him in maybe a day, and I'm already more on edge. I've started seeing things. Sometimes I see things really scary. Sometimes I cry in a corner and murmur to myself. "It's not real, it's not real, it's not real…" I constantly feel like I'm being watched. I constantly feel that someone is going to jump out and murder me. I've got it in my head that it's because Grover stopped talking to me. Grover stopped protecting me from them because he got mad at me. I can't sleep, I can't eat, I have perpetual headaches. The only thing I feel like doing is drawing. I'm getting desperate. I need Grover.

Thalia.

I can't talk to Percy. He's in one of his moods. He's delusional. I don't need delusional right now. Right now I'm lying in my bed wondering how my anger didn't take control of me last night. It's been a long time since I've been scared. I'm usually the one doing the scaring. I'm trying to fathom how I didn't get up to put my mother in a choke hold. I'm trying to understand how people didn't pull me off of her. I'd fantasized about it. Sick, but satisfying for an emotionally unstable person like me. Am I getting soft? Is that a bad thing, or a good thing?

I feel utterly trapped in this room. My breathing gets heavier laying here, and I start to hear an uninvited pant in my breaths. Chiron says that I use aggression to deal with overwhelming emotions. He's not wrong. One of my usual coping methods is punching something over and over again. Tonight, I did just that. I hit the wall next to me with my fist until the pain left and I just felt numb.

I hit that wall until Rachel came over, from the room next to me, and pulled my fist apart, showing me the wounds on my knuckle, and I collapsed into her, sobbing.

Percy.

When Grover comes back, I try hard to control my excitement. I had a headache. There were people talking in my head. I was rocking in a corner, trying not to cry. When the nurse came asking why I was absent from breakfast, I snapped at her. I could feel their presence near me. People were coming to take me away, to kill me. And then he was there.

I was so happy. my mood swung from low to high, and I felt as if nothing could touch me, or hurt me. Not with Grover here.

The problem was, he still looked angry at me. "Grover…" I tried.

"Why aren't you hanging out with your new best friend?"

"Grover, please." I'm desperate. "Help me please. You're my best friend. Please. Please. They're here right now. Help me get rid of them. They're watching me, please Grover."

"You're my lifeline." Because it was true. There was no way I could imagine myself living without Grover.

Grover's eyes turned softer. "I'm here to help you, Percy. Why did you send me away?"

You sent him away. You monster.

"I'm sorry, please. I can't take it anymore." I start breathing harder, hyperventilating.

I'm sorry I'm sorry I'm sorry I'M sorry I'M SORRY

"I thought you didn't need me anymore."

"I do need you...please." I whimper. I can see them getting closer. I can hear their heavy footsteps pounding towards the door to my room. They're going to kill me. I know that they're going to kill me.

"Okay." That one utterance made me look up at him. He looked like his normal self. Confident, back in control. He was going to help me, and that's all that matters. "Get the knife."

"The knife, of course, the knife." I mutter. I stand up from the corner and reach under my mattress for the knife. The knife that i'd bought from the Stolls a few months ago, just in case. It'd cost me an arm and a leg, but it was worth it.

I look at Grover, ready to do whatever he says. As long as the voices stop. As long as the headache goes. As long as he can help me.

"You just need to cut yourself, it's that easy."

I look up at him, hesitating. "Are you sure?"

"Positive. On your arm, I think, would be the most effective. Honestly Perce, it's not that hard." He looks so confident that I forget to question him more.

For a second, I'm confused. I remember what Chiron told me to ask. "Why?"

I regret it immediately. Grover's eyes darken, and in my head I hear millions of people, laughing at me. "They won't...recognize you. With your arms all like that. Plus you're replacing the pain, so that, your headache will go." I furrow my eyebrows.

"Unless, of course, you want me to go again. It's really all scientific Perce. Don't you trust me?"

Obviously he's right, dummy. You really don't trust your best friend?

I feel ashamed. Of course Grover was right. But still…

"Pinky promise?"

"Pinky promise."

We lock fingers. And I, holeheartedly trusting in Grover, move to draw thin lines of blood from my skin.

Annabeth.

I did not have time to stay in bed and sulk over my breakdown. My thin haze of indifference to everyone and everything around me had broken yesterday, and I was determined to never let that happen to me again. Everyone that I felt comfortable hanging around (Thalia, who had quickly become at least a confidant) and everyone I was trying to get to know (Percy, who was still kind of scary to me) had decided to stay in there rooms this morning. No one was in the recreation room after breakfast.

No such luck for me though. I had individual therapy with Chiron first thing. It took maybe 10 minutes to care enough to get out of bed.

...

As I entered the room, Chiron looked ecstatic. His first words came out immediately I sat down, he didn't even wait for me to look remotely interested before speaking.

"Ms. Chase, I do believe we've already made an improvement."

"What?" I was still slightly asleep.

"I'm speaking of, of course, the expression of emotion last evening?"

"You mean when I broke down crying." I gave him an baffled look.

"Ah, there it is again. With this kind of progress you'll be out of here in no time."

His giddy excitement unnerved me, so I settle for glaring at him.

Finally, it occur to him that he's done something wrong. "Oh, dear Annabeth. Excuse me for my lack of sympathy. You must be so confused..."

Instead of replying, I settle for staring at him. The therapy should be starting any minute now.

"Depression is, for a lack of better words, an absence of care. You have no will to do anything anymore. You don't care about anything or anyone. You have no more desire to live. So, when a patient with depression as severe as yours shows great emotion, whether positive or negative, it's a step in the right direction."

"So you want me to cry?" Though his description of how I feel is extremely accurate. "That's great. I cry all the time." I retort with thinly veiled sarcasm.

"No, Annabeth. I want you to feel. That's why you used to cut yourself, right?" I glance down at my arm self consciously. When he sees I have no response for him he continues by handing me a piece of paper and a pen. "Here, Annabeth, I want you to write things that make you happy. This is your lifeline."

I stare at the paper for at least two minutes before writing something. Chiron peeks over the table to see it. "Your little brother. I could see the sort of connection you two had yesterday."

"I can't really think of anything else." I mutter.

"This is a list of things that will keep you alive, Annabeth. Things that will help you through your depression."

I don't write anything else down.

"Okay," Chiron frowns a little, "how about we broaden the topic a little bit. Write down things that make you feel. Any emotion, as long as you feel one."

I still refuse to write anything down, and settle for glaring at the table separating us. When Chiron sees this, he sighs and says, "This is homework for next week, Annabeth. I want you two write down at least ten-" he hesitates, "alright five things that make you feel something."

I don't realize my time is up until Chiron clears his throat and says quietly, "You may leave now Annabeth."

I quickly stand up and hurry out of the room, as if it's suffocating me.

Author's Note:

Question: How many document pages is good for a chapter? I feel like mine are too short, but sometimes I end it whenever I feel like ending it. Please help...