Smile On His Lips and Cuts On His Hips (Jalex)

Nine - Last Resorts

After half an hour of searching the internet and rereading my math notes, my homework had been muddled through. Half my science project was finished and I'd learned all about life cycle of stars, getting me close enough to being prepared for the exam tomorrow. My entire English essay analyzing whether or not Charlie was better off before or after his surgery in Flowers for Algernon was completed, and I'd even managed to shit out an introduction, which I was consistently horrible at writing.

Last on the list of things that needed to be finished that night was studying for the next day's History test - on what appeared to be half of America's entire background - before I could take a shower and get some much needed sleep. Obviously, that was going fabulous.

How did the King of England respond to the Declaration of Independence? read the review section at the end of the chapter I was studying in my textbook.

I groaned, shoving my eyes shut and frowning in concentration as I attempted to pry the answer out of my mind. "Fuck, I don't know," I muttered, flipping back through the pages in search of the solution.

I managed to spend twenty minutes scanning the full, mind numbingly boring chapter, without discovering a single shred of the fucking dead King's answer to the document. I am going to fail this test, I thought, turning back to the questions in hopes of finding out I had at least some of the knowledge necessary to not get kicked out of that class. I didn't.

There was exactly one question where the correct answer was easily answerable for me: who wrote the popular pamphlet, Common Sense? Thomas Paine, of course. I actually remembered that from eighth grade, for some imperceptible reason. Great, I could answer a singular question that had approximately a two percent change of being part of the exam. Fuck.

A combination of thoughts of failure that multiplied frantically, total exhaustion, and excessive stress had me breaking down a second later. My textbook ended up slammed against a wall as I swore and curled my knees into my chest, sweat pants crushing against my eyes.

I'm not smart enough for this, I'm so stupid. I can't do this.

"What the fuck is wrong with me?" I rasped, clueless as to why such a trivial issue had my sanity instantly collapsing. One test wasn't the end of the world - I knew that. I'd probably be the first trying to convince someone that grades weren't everything. So why did I care?

Really, I didn't. But the thoughts inspired to surface by those initial criticisms were discharging all of my insecurities and issues and they wouldn't stop.

Nothing is going right. I won't get into college. I don't even want to go to college, what the hell am I going to do with my life?

"Shut UP!" I exclaimed, hopelessly wishing that the words would cause the thoughts to cease and my mind to recompose itself. I hauled myself up, hands clutching my doorframe, pacing across the carpet and ripping at my hair.

Rubbing harshly at my eyes, swiping tears everywhere and sniffing out a cough, I searched out my iPod, vision too blinded to detect a sensible song as I punched shuffle and turned up the volume. Damnit came on, almost bringing a smile since I'd always loved that song. That lasted for less time than was tangible as my brain spun out of control.

One thing I'd always found relaxing above all else was listening to music. Not just playing it in the background, but really listening - dissecting the lyrics and inhaling the intakes of breath and counting the drum beat and picking out guitar notes. But my brain was determined to self destruct at the moment, and it settled on the guitar beat, appreciating Tom Delonsnge's skill for two seconds before I started thinking of how I'd never be that good.

Why the fuck even bother? No matter how hard I tried, I could never compare to my idols, it was useless. I should just fucking give up. I couldn't successfully play the one thing I cared about; I couldn't study for a fucking test in school without freaking out, what the fuck could I do?