Wow, two in one day, I'm on fire! But, this one is really short and sweet so whateves.

Enjoy.

Slice. Slice. Slice. Drip. Drip. Drip.

She makes little lines on her pale white skin. Small dots of red appear. They bubble up and spill over the lacerated skin.

Slice. Slice. Slice. Drip. Drip. Drip.

She began doing this when after she tried to overdose on the pills. It became worse after her brother died.

Slice. Slice. Slice. Drip. Drip. Drip.

She tried to follow him. She tried slitting her wrists, vertically, which is the only way to go. But, someone found her, she couldn't remember who, and they took her to the hospital.

Slice. Slice. Slice. Drip. Drip. Drip.

She couldn't understand why they just wouldn't let her die. Why God wouldn't let her die. She tried so hard. Why couldn't she get any peace?

Slice. Slice. Slice. Drip. Drip. Drip.

He was gone. Her white knight in shining armor has died trying to rescue the princess. He died and has left her here all on her own in shark infested waters. She didn't know how to swim. She wasn't even sure she wanted to.

Some would say that he died trying to get away from her. She has caused him too many troubles and problems. She was…unstable and although he tried, in the end, he died from his efforts. She killed him. It was as simple as that.

Cut. Cut. Cut. Drip. Drip. Drip.

He's gone and she still lives. She is alone. Totally and utterly alone. She's been deported from America. Without her brother, she couldn't stay there. And since she is completely mentally unstable, she needs care and attention. She was sent to Karakura Mental Hospital for teens, curiosity of her aunt. She doesn't know her name. She doesn't care. She doesn't know night from day.

She looks at all of the red lines that she's made on herself. If she could feel anything other than pain, she would be shock. Shock that she still had blood. She felt empty; she was supposed to be empty. There wasn't supposed to be anything left of her.

How did she get a razor again?

She was outside; the sun was on her face. The place that her aunt is paying for her to go to believes in field trips. They believe in taking the troubled teens around Karakura and showing them the life that they are missing out on. She's been on the outside before. It wasn't anything special. It was just full of pain and suffering. Like she is.

She feels that she is pushed roughly from behind. She falls on her hands and knees. They might be skinned, but she can't tell. The pain is faint.

"Get up you stupid bitch! Fight us with that disgusting hair of yours!" it's the girls from her group. The ones with the body issues. They don't like her for some reason. It was funny, they are all in the same boat, yet they figure to bully her. She wants to laugh, but she doesn't remember how to do it.

They began kicking her and pulling her hair, attempting to pull it out she suppose. Suddenly, the pressure is lifted. She peeks up from the ground to see a skinny boy with spiky black hair beating up the two girls who were beating her up. Once he was done with that he turned around and faced her.

"Can you get up?" it's not a boy at all. But a girl. It's a girl that came to her defense. And now she was offering her hand. Orihime took it, her eyes never leaving the boyish girl that came to her defense. The only person that ever came to her defense was dead. So why is this girl helping her? The girl thunked her on the head. It…hurt.

"Next time, don't just lie there and get beat up. Do something, fight back, call for help, anything! don't just lie there and take it! you're not a ball so you shouldn't take that kind of abuse!" Orihime flinched at the girl yelling at her. She didn't know what to say. Here was this girl that she didn't know and who didn't know her, talking to her as if she actually cared about her wellbeing.

"From the looks of your uniform, you belong to that girls home for the mentally unwell, correct?" she nodded, still not sure what to make of this girl.

"Hmm, I think I should teach you how to fight. That way, when those girls get the courage to bother you again, you can beat them up yourself. Okay?" this girl was determine and proud. She intrigued Orihime, she wanted to know more about her, but decided against it. whenever she made friends, it always ended badly for her. She would not make friends again. So she just left the girl.

The next day, Orihime was informed that she had a visitor. The only person that would ever want to visit her is dead, so who could it be.

It was the short haired girl, naturally.

"Hey, you ran off yesterday and I didn't even get your name!" Orihime was shocked. This spikey haired girl had comeback and she asked for her. She didn't even bother asking her how'd she was able to summon her if she didn't know her name. She was the only one here with weird colored hair.

"My name is Tatsuki Arisawa. What's your name?" this girl looked sincere, and genuine, but so did Ulquiorra, Savannah, and Melissa. Long story short, no one was to be trusted. But still…something in her soul told her that this girl just might be different.

"Orihime. Orihime Inoue," she said in a raspy voice.

Orihime and Tatsuki became fast friends. Or at least, accquntinces. Tatsuki came by every day to teach Orihime how to fight. She never judged her, never asked why she was there, never asked about her scars.

Everyday Orihime became a little bit stronger, physically and mentally. And as her scars from cutting began to heal, so did the ones in her soul. Every now and then she would attempt to smile. Tatsuki would be horrified by it. Orihime didn't understand what was wrong until Tatsuki took a picture and showed it to her. Once Orihime saw it she wanted to tear it to shreds and never smile again.

"NO, I won't let you do that."

"Why not, it's disgusting. Something like that shouldn't exist." She protested.

"That's not true. This is your smile, saying something as terrible as that, is like saying that you shouldn't exist."

"Well, I shouldn't," Tatsuki slapped her hard across her face. Orihime stood shocked, holding her hand to her face.

"Don't you ever say something like that ever again? You do deserve to exist, even if you don't think so. Life is precious so don't take it for granted. No matter how crappy your life is right now, it will always get better as long as you're able to see past the dark areas."

"My life is nothing but a huge dark area. I'm a screw up, my brother is dead, people are always calling me dumb, stupid, and a variety of other things," her voice caught, she felt warm tears slide down her face. Her heart was trembling.

"Orihime the stupid, Orihime the slut, Orihime the screw up." She recited, crying. Tatsuki stood there, staring at her silently.

"Hey, come follow me for a moment," she said to the still crying girl. Through her tears, she followed her to a creek. They sat down in the grass and stared at the fishes in the water for almost an hour. Then Tatsuki spoke.

"You know, a fish is a pretty okay creature," she said contemplatively.

"Why do you say that?" Orihime sniffled.

"Because, no matter what you call it, it's still a fish."

"What?"

"You can go up to a fish and tell it that it's a dumb dog, or tell it that it's a donkey. It won't believe you no matter what you tell it. It knows that it's a fish, and no matter what anyone tells it, it will always know that it's a fish and it will continue doing what fishes do best."

"Which is?"

"Swim of course. It's not going to let what anyone say stop it from doing what it does. It just going to swim."

Orihime thought about it for a moment." Well that's all a fish can do is swim. It can't do anything else. "

"It doesn't want to do anything else. It just wants to swim." Orihime thought again. What did she want to do? Did she want to swim, or was she just going to drown, letting the weight of the world crush her and pin her down?

"Tatsuki…I want to be like a fish." She gave a small smile to her new friend.

I want to swim.