What do you think of when you hear the name Zachary Goode?
Some think of him as the resident bad ass at school who doesn't give a damn about anybody.
Others think he is an arrogant jerk with a cold heart.
Many think that he is an emotionless robot that only knows how to hate.
Truth be told, he's all of them. But no one cared enough to ask why.
This was mostly because he would simply refuse to answer and instead glare at you with such cold eyes it was enough to make you visibly shiver. But that was his nature to do so. He was like the street dog thrown into the kennel who never got adopted, because he wasn't as cute or friendly as the other dogs. He was the mutt people avoided incase he would lash out and tear them limb from limb.
Any many wouldn't put it past him with his history when it came to people.
But it was his way of surviving.
No one noticed the scars on his body. The white ones on his back or the red ones on his arms. And why would they. He didn't want peoples fake sympathy and their pity. He would rather have everyone hate him than have them pretend to care when in fact they don't. So he pushes them away. Because that is all he knows how to do.
It was his wall of safety in which he could hide behind until he was in the bathroom with a blade.
But that was how he survived.
You here all these stories in which the person cuts out of sadness. But Zach cut for all his emotions.
All his emotions he couldn't have.
He never learned to be nice. To love. He was taught how to fight and to never let his guard down, other wise you would be ridiculed as a weakling.
And that was sure as hell not gonna happen.
His father and mother made sure of it.
Of course it wasn't his biological father. He never new him. But that it what made his stepfather hate him even more. Any time he showed weakness growing up, he would be met by the end of an belt in his stepdads hands. He quickly learned to toughen up and shut up.
He first started cutting when his stepdad, Greg, had called him every name under the sun as he ran and hid in the bathroom. With him being only 14, he couldn't defend hisself or his mother. So he hid in the bathroom while he listened to Greg beat his mother to a pulp. He hid.
Like a coward.
It was in this moment that the broken razor blade became his best friend and his only Allie in life. People couldn't be trusted and so you were better off on your own. At least that's what he told himself.
Growing up with his secrets, ment that everything he did would have to have reason. There was no point in arranging to go out with 'friends' when in the end you will just end up with a knife in your back and time wasted. People would pretend like they care, but they never ment it. It was just the thing people say to earn your trust and than just smash it.
He had all the friends he needs. And it they were small, silver, and sharp...
But no matter what he told himself, he was lonely.
He wasn't a cutter. He was an artist of sorts. He just used a different type of Paper to draw on; his skin. Some people think it's wrong to want to cut up your skin, that it just leaves you with horrible scars. But to him, each scar showed a story that was filled with emotion and it didn't destroy beauty. It helped you find it. Of course he would never tell anyone this, cause no one needed to know. He didn't have
Until he met her.
*.*.*.*.*.*.*.*.*.*.*.*.*.*
'She got quieter,
Her nights got longer,
Her blades got bigger,
Her sleeves got longer,
Her meals got smaller,
She became skinnier,
Her music got louder,
And no one
Noticed.'
Cammie Morgan. Cutter. That's all any one ever new about her. No one could see pass the scars that were buried in her skin, layer after layer. No one new there story, simply because no one ever cared after they saw.
People are afraid to ask, there afraid of something they don't understand.
There were very few people who tried to understand and even then they still couldn't.
You don't understand cutting, unless you have. No one knows the pain of losing your dad, unless you have. And that is why Cammie never let nobody in, not because she didn't want to; because she didn't need to. In her mind, unless someone had been through her pain, then they couldn't understand.
When Cammie had started cutting, she quickly learned how to hide it. Evidently, she also knew how to spot it.
She could see the reason why those people you know always wore long sleeves in summer.
How the girls would were bracelets up there arm all the time.
Why those dudes never took of their jacket.
Behind every forced laugh, smile and sentence, she could hear the pain. How their smile never quite reached their eyes, or the hurt hiding behind them in depths.
She knew because she did the exact same thing everyday. She knew she was depressed, but she didn't want to admit it.
Every day, she was fighting a battle with herself. She would argue with the mirror about how she looks. About how those scars on her body destroyed anything worthwhile.
No one had ever told her different. After her fathers death, no one was there to help cushion her fall. She only ever wanted for someone to tell her they love her and she was worth something. But after years of wishing, no one ever showed up.
'Depression is were someone has so much love but no one to give it too.'
Until him.
*.*.*.*.*.*.*.*.*.*.*.*
Later in life, they both had to thank their English teacher, Mr Solomen, who had paired them together for there projects. Get to know your partner and write a poem about them. Of course, no one wanted to be with them though.
No one liked being with the strange kid.
And that's what they both were considered. Strange. But too each other, when their sleeves would accidentally fall down for a second showing red puffy lines in class, they were the same.
They were both hurting. And trying to hide it behind a mask.
'Yes I'm smiling, but inside I'm dying.'
And maybe they could help heal the pain together.
*.*.*.*.*.*.*.*.*.*
"Can you show me ?"
"... I'll show you mine if you show me yours..." I say looking down at him, turning my head away from the stars. I knew what he was talking about. It was what I wanted to ask him but never had the guts too. We had been building up this moment for weeks. The one time we were going to let our guards down and trust.
We were going to show each other our scars.
Over the last couple of weeks, I learned some stuff about Zachary Goode. He wasn't made of stone. He wasn't as tough as every thought. He had the same voice inside his head that tells him one more, the same as me. The same one saying he wasn't good enough.
He was hurt. Just. Like. Me.
Maybe that's why when we both rolled down our sleeves as we sat in front of the water, I didn't feel ashamed to have marks across my once clear skin, as I wasn't the only one anymore who had been in pain.
When he looked down embarrassed about his deeper cuts, I simply kissed his scars. And I listened as he told me about the story of each one.
I let a single year roll down my cheek as I told him about the words I had carved onto my arm. When he saw the butterfly I had carved into my arm, I told him how I believed butterfly's were loved ones recreated; about how it represented my dad. When he saw the words ' not Goode enough' scared across my left arm, he said I was like a butterfly...
"Why am I ?"
"Because butterfly's are beautiful but they don't know it, because they can't see their wings. Just like you don't know how how much your worth. To me..."
I let him hold me while I cried, and for once in a very long time, I had someone to dry my tears.
And he wasn't lonely.
*.*.*.*.*.*.*.*.*.*.*.*
I knew a guy that liked to draw,
He drew pictures that nobody saw.
He was most artistic late at night,
In the bathroom, out of sight.
He kept a secret that nobody knew,
He didn't tell a soul and his gallery grew.
His drawing were different, no paper or pen.
But needed a bandage ever now and again.
We stood by the river under the stars,
He rolled up his sleeves and showed me his scars.
He felt embarrassed and looked down at his shoes,
Then I rolled up my sleeves and whispered
" I draw too"...
A/n: Hey guys I know I should be updating my other story "love is a battle field" but I'm working on the next chapter so it's gonna be longer than other chapters, so I wrote this a while back and so to make sure you guys have something to read I decided to post it. This is a one-shot but I may use it in future stories, I'm not a sure yet.
I know this is really depressive compared to my other work, but I just had think it was important to write it as Depression has changed my life as my closes family members have it, and so have I. Everything I wrote in this comes from my heart and what I have felt, so play nice in those reviews.
I mentioned in this about how butterfly's represent dead love ones, and I truly believe this. I read it in a book a few years ago and it just kind of stuck.
Also there are some of my favourite quotes in here that I really just wanted to share. They are really powerful.
I haven't read many story's were it really says anything about guys cutting, but I know several guys who do, so I think it's important that we remember, guys hurt too.
'If two halves of a broken heart make one whole,
Then maybe two Broken people can make each other whole again.'
-unknown