Just words chapter 2

Alright guys, first of all I should start with an apology. I am so sorry for the wait for this chapter. I have been having a rough time so getting this chapter out has been pretty slow. Hopefully I'll be able to write more over winter break since it is coming up soon. I just want to say thank you to those who have reviewed. Your kind words inspire me and make me smile. One in particular made me so happy, you know who you are, and gave me a wonderful idea for this story. So thank you to all of my readers and reviewers. You are not faceless to me. You're family. Anyway. Shutting up now. Here's chapter 2!

After I turned around again to face the board, I hear Jared take a sharp breath and whimper. Good. If it's even possible for him to feel pain, I want him to feel it all. I want him to feel as bad about himself I do. I want him to suffer through the humiliation, isolation, and self mutilation that I have. He's hurt me so deeply, so irrevocably. I loved him for a long time. I loved him despite the names he substituted for the real one. I forgave him for the name-calling in the hallways. I loved him enough to starve myself so that one day I would be beautiful enough for him. Now, I starve myself because it is pain that I can control. All the hurt I've experienced has been out of control but starving and ripping my skin apart is pain that I can control. I can control when to eat. I control how deep the blade goes and how many lines will for beautiful scars to remind me that I was alive once. Because if I bleed I had to be alive right?

I couldn't control my dad leaving and I couldn't stop my mom from drinking. I couldn't stop them taking me from her and making me the burden of my brother. I couldn't stop Kat. I couldn't save Kat. After she died I grew to hate him. I grew to hate him after he videotaped me and posted it online for his twisted pleasure. I learned to loathe him when I returned to school after Kat's funeral and he said, "The slut finally killed herself. Now we only have one more to worry about."

He felt no remorse in tormenting us until we broke. I loved him and he tortured me. I'm beyond loving anyone now. Someone tapping on my shoulder brings me out of the past and it's then that I realize I'm crying. Silently, big fat tears glide down my cheeks and drop onto the desk.

"Please look at me."

Jared. He will never leave me alone. I just want to be invisible to him. I can't take this anymore.

"What's my name? I'll look at you if you can tell me my real name."

"I can't. I don't know it."

I give a sarcastic laugh.

"Figures. The girl you publicly humiliate, the girl you call fat, the girl you told to kill herself, and you can't even remember her name."

"Please I'm sorry! I was a stupid kid and-"

"I was a kid too! I was a kid and you killed me!"

By this point I was shouting and everyone in the class was staring at the two of us. I stood up, grabbed my stuff and ran out of the classroom. I hadn't made it halfway to the bathroom when hands grabbed my shoulders, bruising me.

"Kim, where are you going?"

Paul. Paul Lahote was another football player but he's not bad once you get to know him. He's not me per se, he just doesn't take other people giving him shit. He was always nice to me and Kat. He looked out for me from time to time after she died. There was really only one problem that I had with Paul; he was still best friends with Jared even after all these years. He didn't condone Jared's actions or anything but he did nothing to stop him.

"I'm leaving."

"What do you mean, Kimmy? Where are you going?"

I hate it when he calls me that. My mom called me that.

"I can't do this anymore Paul. I wanna go."

"Just talk to him Kim. He's changed."

"Yeah right. You try going through everything that animal did to me and then come back and tell me to give him a chance. Jared is incapable of feeling Paul. He doesn't care about you or me. Jared only cares about himself. He's shown that pretty clearly."

"You're wrong."

I turned to see Jared walking towards us.

"You're wrong Kim."

I just stared at him blankly.

"I care about you. I want you to be safe and happy and I want to take care of you."

Suddenly I understand what's happening. I get it now.

"This is a joke right? Of course it is. Let's all make Jared pretend to care about poor little Kim to destroy her some more when she realizes it was all a joke."

"Kim, please! I'm not trying to hurt you. I'm sorry for everything I did in the past but you have to believe me when I say I've changed. I'm not the same person anymore."

"I believe you Jared. I believe that you're not the same person you were. You're not the same little boy who gave me a ninja turtles band-aid when I scraped my knee. But the thing is Jared, I've changed too. I'm not the same little girl that look at you with such devotion only to be robber of her childhood when you're emotional abuse turned physical. I'm not the same girl you videotaped in a vulnerable moment to put online for others to view. I know who you are now Jared. You are destruction. You demolished everything I was. You are the type of person who makes a website dedicated to mocking a girl with photos and videos you uploaded. You posted stories and comments that you had or others told you. Then you sent the link to the website and emailed comments that others had posted to that girl so she cries herself to sleep at night in a bloody shirt from where she slices her skin to numb the pain of the words she reads. When she wakes up in the morning she goes to the mirror and lifts up her shirt to make sure she can still count her ribs without sucking her stomach in so that you won't call her fat. You, Jared, you are a murder, a torturer. You wanted me gone. Well congratulations. I'm dead.

Jared is shaking by this point. And then, I realize, so am I. I'm steadily crying and his eyes have filled up with tears that he refuses to let fall. God, he must be a really good actor.

"Jared, man you have to go. You need to get out of here. Right now Jared. Call Sam but you need to go before you hurt somebody."

"No!" he shouted. "I need to stay with her!"

"Jared you're scaring her."

"Shut UP Paul! You don't understand!"

Jared breaks from his spot in the hallway and stomps towards us. He grabs my hand, engulfing it in the scalding heat of his own. He drags me along the hallway towards the student parking lot before I manage to speak.

"Jared, let me go."

"No! Kim, I need you to listen to me and you are obviously not going to do that in there."

"You know, if you want a girl, or anyone for that matter really, to listen to you, dragging them against their will is probably not the best way to achieve that."

We were halfway across the parking lot and I realized that Jared was taking me to his truck.

"Jared let me go!"

"Kim, please just hear me out."

"Why? Why should I listen to you? Everything you say just ends up hurting me."

"I'm so sorry. But I really have changed. I'm not that guy anymore."

"'Sorry' can't take the pain of the past away Jared."

"I know."

"Then you should know that this," I waved my hand between the two of us, "whatever this is, is never going to work."

"It has to Kim. There are a lot of things that you don't know and I can't tell you yet, but I promise I will one day. Soon"

"Things you can't tell me? Seriously? There were so many things that you shouldn't have said to me that you did, Jared! And you did it without remorse!"

"Please Kim. I know I messed up but-"

"You didn't 'mess up'. You ruined me. It's impossible for me to forgive you. I won't forgive you. It's not as simple as saying 'sorry' and everything goes back to the way it was."

Jared's face fell and his grip on my hand slackened just enough for me to finally tug my arm away. I started walking back to the school building when I heard him call out.

"I'll prove it to you. I'll prove to you that I've changed."

"How, Jared? How can you fix this? It's not that simple. I'm broken Jared, and you can't fix me."

"You're wrong. I can fix you. But I don't need to. You're so strong Kim. So strong."

"Stop it! I can't do this anymore! I can't keep putting my faith into you only to be hurt again."

"God, Kim. I won't. I swear I'll never hurt you again. Please believe me. Let me take you somewhere and we can talk more. That's all. I just want to talk. If it gets to be too much or you still are unconvinced I'll take you home. Ok? Just please listen to me, baby."

I was in the past again. I was so far down the rabbit hole I didn't even register the pet name.

"That's what they said too. But they lied."

"Who?"

"Everyone. They all promised they wouldn't hurt me but they did."

And then I'm gone. Lost in the memories again with no way out.

My mom hitting me in a drunken haze and then crying and clutching me against her so hard I can't breathe and begging me to forgive her and that she would never do it again. Telling me not to tell anyone what happened. I'm a good girl, so I don't.

Flashing forward to when child services took me away and put me in a temporary home until my brother got back to Washington and got custody of me. The father telling me I would be safe with them. He snuck into my bedroom at night and touched me while his wife and son were sleeping down the hall.

Living with my brother who worked himself into the ground so he could support us. Working two, sometimes three, jobs to pay rent and pay for food. He's never home. I miss him. He always protected me because he was so much older.

Meeting Kat after some girl dumped her tray on me for sitting at her group's table and in her spot. Kat cleaning me up and promising me that we would be best friends for life. But then Kat ended hers and left me alone again. It's like the other half of my being was ripped away when I saw her in our bathroom with an empty pill bottle clutched in her hands.

When I come back to the present I'm on the ground leaning on a random car with Jared clutching on to me and begging me to breathe.

I'm sobbing so hard and my lungs hurt. I can't breathe. I don't want to breathe. Breathing means I'm alive and life means getting hurt. I don't want to hurt anymore.

"Kim, baby, I need you to breathe for me honey ok. Just take deep breaths with me."

Together we breathe slowly and I start to feel less dizzy.

"It's gonna be ok. I'm not going to let anyone hurt you ever again."

He pulls my head further into his chest and rests his cheek on the crown of my head. His left arm wrapped around my waist and his right stroking my hair.

I felt safe for the first time in a long time. Then I remember who was holding me and I tensed. I tried to push away from him but he only held me tighter.

"I know you're afraid Kim. I know you don't trust me yet and that's okay. But I just want to prove to you that I'm a better man."

"I don't want to hurt anymore."

"I won't let you hurt anymore. And if you still are hurting, you won't be alone."