”You’re ruining my life Shaun! You can’t tell me what to do anymore; I’m fifteen, not seven!” I screamed at my brother, I was riddled with emotion. He didn’t understand that I wasn’t seven years old anymore.
“You can’t just bully people like that Hazel, you don’t understand!” He thumped his hand down on the wooden kitchen table, making it shake violently from the impact.
“Well she’s a bitch; she made out with Tyler and lied about it. Because of her I had to break up with the love of my life!” I burst out in to tears, violently shaking as the memories of my boyfriend’s lips pressed to that blonde bimbo crossed through my mind.
“Keep your anger to yourself then, you can’t spit in somebody’s face and call them a slut, it’s rude.” Shaun’s face was filled with aggression as he paced around the room.
“Well she is a slut!” I wiped the tears from my eyes, trying to compose myself once more.
“Hazel stop it, who have you become?” he whispered just loud enough so that I could hear. “You don’t understand what bullying can do to somebody.”
My alarm clock beeped, breaking me out of my horrific dream; well actually it was more like a horrific memory, disguised as a dream. I pulled the covers off of my body and ran to the bathroom to splash water in my face as if it could take away the images of that night, the images that had been haunting my dreams every night for the last two years.
I got myself ready for school and made my way downstairs only to see that my mother was sitting in the exact same position that I left her last night, curled up in a ball on our navy blue, leather couches. “Mom,” I whispered in her ear, she jumped at the sound of my voice.
“Darling, please don’t do that again, you startled me.” She crinkled her eyebrows and the frown that she always wore was dragged down even more.
“Mom, are you going to be alright today, or do you need me to stay home?” I sat down on the carpeted floor next to the sofa and leaned my left arm on it.
“I should be fine honey; dad’s coming home from New York today.” She tried to fake an excited smile, but it looked so wrong and contorted on her face full of anguish. I instantly was on guard the second she said dad was coming home. That meant that he was done with his new model girlfriend in New York City and was coming back to mum to screw around with her feelings for a couple of days before taking off again to have yet another affair. I vowed to myself last time that I wouldn’t let him do that to her again.
“I’m not leaving you alone with that man,” I stated, eyes widened in fury.
“That man is your father, and I love him.” Her eyebrows were ruffled, and she had an expression on her face that made it seem as if she was having an internal debate with herself. My anger grew as I struggled to hold back tears, I couldn’t let that horrible man touch my mother ever again, I vowed that I wouldn’t.
“No mom, he’s a terrible, evil man, why can’t you see that? He doesn’t love you and you shouldn’t love him. Every time he goes away and he cheats on you, then when he comes back he does that stuff…” I trailed off, leaving the harsh words go unsaid. “He makes you feel dirty and then he leaves again and finds another girl to screw over, don’t let him do this to you again.” Sobs escaped my mouth and tears poured from my eyes as I said the last few words. That evil man was ruining mine and my mother’s life.
“I don’t believe that, he loves me Hazel, I know he does.” Tears slid down her cheeks as she spoke the words I never wanted to here come out of her mouth, about that horrible man.
“Mom you know he doesn’t, stop lying to yourself,” I pleaded, wiping back tears from my eyes.
“Please just leave Hazel, I can handle your dad.” She turned around and faced away from me, hiding her face in the cushions of the couch.
I was reluctant to leave but it wasn’t a good idea for me to skip the second day of school, and mom assured that I didn’t need to stay home for her. So I stopped sobbing and just left, it’s what she wanted and I would do anything for her.
I sat in between Ivy and Declan in English, Ms Myers was rambling on about how Shakespeare made the best plays in the world, in my opinion I thought Shakespeare was completely boring, the only reason that people though that any of Shakespeare’s plays were good was because it was written years ago. Take Romeo and Juliet for example, if somebody right now wrote a book about two teenagers, meeting, having sex two days later and killing themselves then people would hate it and it would get so many bad reviews that the author would probably go in to hiding.
Ivy, Declan and I were sitting in the back of the room and instead of listening to Mrs Myers ramble on we were talking about Declan’s old school. Apparently they didn’t even have high school cheerleaders in Australia. “What were your peers like?” Ivy asked him.
“Well you know, it’s kind of just like here except nicer. We didn’t really have that much of a social hierarchy that I’ve noticed here. We all pretty much just left each other alone if we didn’t like them. I mean sure, some of the girls were really bitchy and would bully people but that happens everywhere.” He leaned his head on his hand, which was perched on the desk he was sitting at.
“That sounds so much better than this stupid school.” I sighed in exasperation. “So why’d come here?”
“Well, I had this friend called Shane,” he began, his face showed signs of despair as he continued. “In the middle of last year, he told me he was gay. We were sitting in the park one day and he just came right out and said it, but he didn’t know that Stephanie- a girl from our school who was known for gossiping- was sitting right behind us. The next day everybody in the entire school knew about it and they bullied him for it. Three months later he hanged himself. I had a breakdown, I couldn’t stand living their anymore so my parents got a job here.”
“Your friend killed himself because of bulling?” My mouth gaped open. I didn’t hear his response because suddenly I tuned out.
“You’re an idiot Shaun, I freaking hate you. How about you go jump off a cliff!” I screamed at him as I ran up the stairs to my room, slamming the door. I thumped myself down on the bed as sobs convulsed out of my body. I stayed in that position, faced down on the bed for at least half an hour, until the time when my mum was due home.
“Hey honey, how was your day today?” my mother asked as I made my way down the stairs, I ran towards her and wrapped my arms around her waist.
“It was terrible mum, Tyler cheated on me with Kaitlyn and I watched her do it!” I sobbed. “And worst of all she lied about it to my face when I called her out on it!”
“Oh honey, it will be okay. I’m sure she was just trying to protect you.” Mum squeezed me tighter as I sobbed in to her chemically-straightened brown hair.
“Protect me by stealing my boyfriend!?” I screeched in between sobs, I withdrew myself from my mother’s protective arms and sat on a stool at the kitchen island.
“No I mean protect you by lying, maybe he kissed her and she didn’t want it to happen, but then she also didn’t want to see you unhappy so she lied.” Mum strolled over and sat at the seat beside me, she placed her right hand on my shoulder to try and comfort them.
“No mum, I saw her grab his shirt and pull him in to it!” I rested my head against my forearm as my tears began to weaken, my brown curly hair dropped to the sides of my face, singular hairs began to stick to my tear stained cheeks.
“Well, what happened when you confronted her?” she asked me.
“Well I called her a slut…” I trailed off. “And I also might have spat in her face.”
“Hazel you can’t do that, that’s so rude!” My mother’s face grew angry as she yelled at me; maybe I had gone too far.
“Earth to Hazel!” Ivy waved her hands in my face, drawing me out of my horrible day dream.
“Sorry, I drifted out for a while,” I mumbled, setting my eyes down towards my desk and playing with my fingers awkwardly.
“A while!? You were out of it for the entire lesson!” she squealed, I looked around to see that her, Declan and I were the only students left in the classroom.
“Crap!” I exclaimed as I packed up my stuff, I slung my bag on my shoulder as I rushed out of the classroom, Declan and Ivy following close behind me .
Science was such a boring subject, I spent most of the lesson either questioning Declan or trying to fall asleep. I had given Declan my phone number and added him on F acebook last night and after about two hours of non-stop chatting I thought that I’d really gotten to know him. We played twenty questions last night over Facebook and I had found out that his favourite colour was purple, his favourite television show was The Big Bang Theory, his favourite movie of all time was Battleship and he had two sisters called Hannah and Elinor, but Hannah had stayed in Australia and lived with his uncle because she had a scholarship at a prestige dance school in Sydney. Elinor was out of high school and had taken a gap year from college to look after her newborn child Connor, Elinor’s husband Chris had also moved to Eastern California with them and had gotten a job as a mechanic.
The rest of the school day past quickly, Declan and I got in a paint fight during art and ended up looking like rainbows, as we walked home we talked about random things, I found that I could talk to him about anything, he was just a genuinely good person. When we reached my house I heard yelling coming from upstairs, I assured him that it would be fine and I rushed upstairs to see what was happening.
“You’re always gone Richard, you’re tearing this family apart!” I heard my mum yell while I ran up the stairs.
“Maybe you’re tearing this family apart Helen, you’re always crying, maybe if you were there for Hazel instead of spending your life in a sea of depression you would actually be able to help her!” my father screamed back at her, I slammed my parents’ bedroom door open just in time to see my dad backhand my mother, knocking her down to the ground.
“You bastard!” I screamed at him before running to my mother’s side, she had a burning red mark on her cheek and she had been knocked out cold when she had hit the ground.
“You shouldn’t talk to your father like that,” he said calmly as he sat down on my mother’s queen side bed.
“You’re no father to me!” I spat at him as I tried to hold back tears.
“Don’t you dare talk to me like that or I will kick you out of this house so fast you won’t even know what happened,” he threatened me, he sent me a murderous glare making my stomach turn.
“You don’t even live here!” I protested.
“This is my house Hazel, I will come and go whenever I like and you just have to learn to live with it. Now I’m going to Toronto for about a month, and when I come back I want yourself and your mother on your best behaviours, I don’t want another repeat of this debacle.” He got up off the bed and walked out of the door, I didn’t look at him the whole time, I couldn’t give in to his obvious attempt of trying to control us again. Instead, I just held on to mom.
“Get a divorce!” I screamed at him as I felt his presence leave the room.
“Never going to happen!” he yelled back, he slammed the front door on the way out and I instantly felt my body relax. I should have never gone to school, I should have been here for her. A million thoughts rushed through my mind as I curled up on the floor next to my mom. Anything could have happened while I was away.
“Hazel,” I heard my mom mumble, I lifted my head as my mother’s eyes flickered open. “I need to get a divorce.” Her voice came out week as if she was straining to speak the words.
“Yes.” I tried to wrap my arms around her but she lightly pushed me off, she managed to stand up by herself and she didn’t seem to have any serious injuries so I let her walk. “Do you think you will be okay by yourself if I went and did some homework? I’ll walk you to the house and put on The Bold and The Beautiful for you first.” I helped my mother down the stairs and turned the television on for her.
“I’ll cook dinner tonight mom, you just relax.” I assured her before racing up the stairs.
Once I had reached my room I rifled through my underwear draw until I brushed my hand over something sharp and cold, my razor blade. I grabbed it out of the draw and rushed in to the bathroom, making sure to lock the door as I entered.
I sat on the edge of the bath tub, swinging my legs in to the middle. I turned the cold water tap on and let the water run through the bath so I wouldn’t have to wash it out when I was done. I slashed the blade across my wrist six times as tears fell down my face, blood dripped down in to the awaiting water and I watched as it spread itself out, mixing in with the blood. I sat on the tub of the bath just watching the blood drip down, releasing all the sorrow that I had accumulated during the day. I felt myself drifting out again as the blood began to disappear down the drain of the bathtub.
“Where’s your brother?” My mother asked as I settled down and stopped crying.
“He went up to his room to play video games, he was angry at me for bullying Kaitlyn,” I replied. She made her way up the stairs and I grabbed a glass of water to try and drink away the lump that had formed in my throat.
My mother screamed as I was about to take a seat back down on the stool that I was sitting in previously, the high pitched squeal frightened me and I dropped my glass cup, it smashed on the floor. Ignoring all the glass that I had just smashed on the ground I ran up the stairs to see why my mother had screamed, only to see the scene that would hurt my thoughts for the rest of my life. My brother was on the ground, his neck broken. A rope was sprawled above his body and glass from the large light bulb that had once hung on his bedroom ceiling, was shattered around him. My mother stood above him sobbing as she held a note in her hand and a loud sob escaped my body as she handed the note to me and I read the first sentence written on the page.
‘I was bullied sis, they bullied me. For two years they called me a nerd, or a loser. I couldn’t take it anymore. I couldn’t live with myself anymore sis, but I snapped when I found out you were bullying somebody, I couldn’t live on this planet anymore knowing that somebody that shared my DNA was doing something that caused people like me such pain. But don’t blame yourself sissy, this was always bound to happen. I love you sissy and I love mommy, please tell her this was nobody’s fault but theirs. I will always miss you.’