Chapter 33

Please no. Please no. Please no. Please, please, please.

It's funny how time liked to be slow and fast at the same time. Or, rather, whenever it wanted. When taking a test four minutes could past in a blink of an eye. But, when taking another test, four minutes could move like the space between heartbeats.

She counted every one. Every hard thump of her heart against her ribs as she waited. And waited. And waited.

Four minutes.

240 seconds threatening to separate her life into Before and After.

240 seconds worth of rewinding and wondering where she deviated off the path that had been laid out for her so carefully.

She sighed an agonized sigh and dragged her fingers through her hair. They got snarled momentarily but she worked them free, running them down her neck, pressing into the tight muscles knotting up like beads on a string.

One minute down.

Or three minutes to go.

She didn't know which was worse.

A crack in the mirror split her face in half. How fitting. She'd always felt torn down the middle.

In one hand she held the face of the perfect little girl for her parents. In the other, she held the face of the class president her peers came to admire. Both came together in a seamless mask for those that knew her. But they didn't really know her. Hell didn't know herself anymore. The real her had been pushed down, hidden from the world, peering out only when the mask separated just so, when she could breathe, when she wanted to scream. All she wanted was a break. All she wanted was to live.

Two minutes.

Halfway.

She tugged at her hair, coiling the bouncing spiral around her finger, retreating to the bathroom stall. Graffitied to the point the original paint color peppered out between the vast array of handwriting, it encased her with its high walls and seclusion. Bleeding hearts and diatribes scribbled across the surface offered windows in the minds of the faceless.

Julie Santana Wuz Here '76.

Love is for Losers.

Call for a ride 5̶5̶5̶-̶7̶0̶1̶9̶← DON'T CALL THIS NUMBER!

Mr. Sands is soooo hot!

This is the closest we'll ever get.

See you all in hell!

Don't blink.

Brittany McNulty is a tease.

I didn't ask for it. I couldn't talk.

Cut on the sharp bite of reality, I dive back in again just to feel something.

Hope is all I've got.

Don't walk, run the other way. Faster. Hurry.

Delaney's a liar.

I miss my friends. Why did things have to change?

A few lists were thrown in the mix as well, the Hottie Lost, the Not List, the Best Butt list, the Best Eyes list, Best Hair (she was at the top of the list for that one), the Biggest Boobs list. Splinters of the past etched into eternity. How did they end up? Did they do what they wanted? Did they achieve their dreams? Did their lives go according to plan? What was the point of a plan when one choice could make everything unravel like a tug on cheap wool?

Dragging her finger against the necks of the cartoon depiction of the baseball team, she went back to the sink. She shook out her hands. She took in a breath for three, held it for four, and let it out for five. Her perfect pageant mantra rising to the top of her mind: chin up, shoulders back, face it.

Cold seeped into her fingers as she gripped the smooth startingly white porcelain in an otherwise dingy room. Her eyes followed the darkened, caked on lines in the cracks between the tiles. Her heavy breath fogged the glass. Water droplets leaking out the faucet exploded against the raised stopper.

Four minutes.

She looked down and her world ended with a whimper.

"Shit."

a/n - happy new year, everyone! last update of the year! i wanted to get something up before the end of the year but, as usual, my chapters tend to run long and i wouldn't finish in time. but! i got the idea for this segment this morning and it really ties everything together as we move into the last section of this story (there's still a good amount of chapters left, don't worry, it's not ending yet!) the next one is coming soon! In the meantime you can check out my new story on my profile, Curveball. it's a high school AU of this fic.

thank you again and see you all in 2023! i love you all! 💙