"Cody! What are you doing?!"

I looked up in to Zack's eyes. They were full of worry as he ran across the bathroom to me snatching the blade from my hands.

"So you won't talk to me, but you'll cut!" he said with a hint of hurt in his voice.

"It's not like that-" I said trailing off at the end.

"Then what is it like? Tell me Cody."

"It just… helps."

"Oh, so I can do it too because it helps, right? Is that what you're saying?"

"No."

"Then what? You know maybe I should try it. Try to see what you see in it."

I watched as he cut two cuts into his arm and was about to make another cut when I yelled out "Stop! Okay I get it! I shouldn't do it!"

"You're right you shouldn't do it. Cody if it's this bad, why don't you just talk to me about it. If not me, then at least someone else! Don't sink down to hurting yourself to make it better." He said breaking the blade in half throwing it across the room before grabbing the first-aid kit.

I watched him slowly patch up mine and his cuts, wrapping gauze around our arms. After he cleaned up the mess he turned to me and said, "Alright, spill."

"What?"

"Tell me what happened, now!"

"You're not giving me a choice now?"

"You're dang right I'm not! Cody, I just came in on you cutting yourself. Something is obviously wrong and I don't won't to wait for you to be about to kill yourself or already dead before I find out what happened. Now you're telling me what happened. Neither one of us is leaving this bathroom until you tell me what's wrong. And I can tell when you're lying Cody, you're an open book to me when you're lying, so don't even think of doing that. And your 'puppy-dog face' ain't gonna work this time either! So come out with it!"

I looked him slowly in the eyes. I knew what I was about to tell him would make him hate me forever. To disown me as a brother. I knew Zack would think I was being weak for not being able to stop them form doing it. Especially that I was crying over it and that I had to wind up sleeping in his bed every night for the past week because of the nightmares.

If it was Zack, he wouldn't be making a big deal of this as I am. He would suck it up and deal with it.

I let out a deep breath before saying "I was raped," as I looked back at the ground. I couldn't look him in the eyes when he was about to yell as me for being weak.

I heard the door open and I looked up to see Zack walking out the door, slamming it behind him. This was exactly why I didn't want to tell anyone.

I let a tear fall slowly down my cheek leaving a stained trail of watery salt behind it.