She holds the silver blade to her wrist, captivated by
the way the reflected light seemed to be winking at her. Her breathing is heavy
and her heartbeats sound loudly through her body, each beat striking a
resounding chord as it sends red, hot blood through her system.
There is a buzzing in Jael’s head. The room feels
unbearably hot even as the air conditioner blows its cool air all around her.
Jael could feel herself swaying, as if to some invisible music only for her
ears or perhaps some invisible force was rocking her.
“Fuck the world,” she thinks, her mind numbed by alcohol
and her heart shattered by pain. Tears spring to her eyes.
She drops the blade and raises the bottle to her lips. It
burns as she swallows, leaving a trail of liquid fire and then a firey inferno
explodes within her. At first, Jael has to dilute the alcohol with mixers; the
taste was too pungent for her; but the more she drank, the less she actually
tasted it and soon, she was drinking straight from the bottle.
"Those who know You, Lord, will trust You; You do
not abandon anyone who comes to you. Psalms 9:10," she whispers to
herself. A strong Christian believer and a church-going girl but one day, Jael
woke up and found her life crashing down around her. "Why am I so messed
up? How did I lose control? I can’t. I just can’t do this anymore."
Deep inside her, her conscience was trying desperately to
surface, to spread logic and reason but its efforts were doused by the alcohol
like fire to water. 'Romans 12:21, 1 Corinthians 10:13, Deuteronomy 8:16,
Leviticus 26:11-12.' Scriptures recited in her mind but she had no idea what
they were or what they meant. They kept coming and repeating themselves until
finally the words blended together and faded into a blurry mess that sank into
the borders of her mind.
She tries to pick up the blade but her hand keeps meeting
the cold, hard floor. “Whoops,” she giggles. “So cold!” Her hands are freezing,
as if she had plunged them into a bucket if icy water. Jael pressed her palms
to her cheeks and immediately, warmth spreads through her palms and into her
fingers. The warmth is comforting.
Jael brings the glass bottle to her lips and tilts her
head all the way back, finishing the last of the rum. Or maybe its tequila, she
couldn’t remember. Slowly, carefully and with the concentration of a bomb
squad, she finally manages to pick up the small 20cents blade.
Jael eyes the piece of sharp metal in her hand like a new
toy she’s always wanted, as if it held the untold wonders that could bring her
joy. Perhaps it could. Jael takes a deep breath, the cold air pierces her
lungs, and pulls the blade across her right wrist. She feels the sting of the
skin as it split, the sweet swelling rise of blood. It hurt, though not as much
as everything else.
Closing her eyes with her head tilted slightly back, Jael
scored the blade across her wrist again. She holds in her breath. It feels as
if she is opening a vent, allowing some of the tremendous pressure inside of
her to ease. She had almost forgotten how good it felt.
She watches with satisfaction as more blood appears.
Shining red blood. Jael feels an immense relief, as if it was her pain, not
blood, that is flowing freely out of her. She cuts a like parallel to the
others and breaths out a sigh. It hurts so much on the inside, the pain outside
took her mind off everything else.
Jael watches as her blood slowly starts flowing along her
arm. The world seems to still; there is only her, sitting motionless on her
bedroom floor. Her blood is a dark, ruby red that glistens where it catches the
light as it slowly trickles down her arm and drips slowly but surely onto the
smooth, white marble floor.
Her blood makes a soft splat as it hits the ground or
maybe it is only in her mind. Her entire system was so concentrated with
alcohol that nothing at all makes sense, even her existence.
‘This is wrong.’ The thought sparks from no where. Jael
shakes her head furiously, as if to shake the cobwebs from her mind that are
restricting her thoughts. Seizing the opportunity, her conscience tries to
strike a blow.
The
memory of the first time she had gotten caught drinking by her best friends
played in her mind. All of them had expressed such unrivaled disappointment,
frustration and even anger. She had promised to stop. It took a while for them
to stop secretly rummaging through her room and sniffing her bottles for that
tell-tale pungent alcohol smell but soon, they were satisfied and glad she had
really stopped. Jael was too.
It lasted for two months until her avalance of
unidentifiable alien emotions started to build up again and seemed to supress
even the ease to breathe.
“I promised,” she whispers tearfully. It had broken her
heart when she realized how much her friends cared for her and how much she had
let them down but here she was, breaking their trust and screwing herself up
again. She had betrayed them. She had betrayed herself.
Suddenly, Jael is repulsed by the sight of her bleeding
arm. “I promised. I said I wouldn’t get addicted again.” Tears sprung to her
eyes and she rocked herself back and forth, cradling her bloody wrist. It had
been so easy to hide her renewed addiction. She had to drink too much or when
she couldn’t hide the redness of her face. She snuck out the alcohol from her
parents’ liquor cabinet and stored them in small bottles, hidden carefully in
the nooks and crannies of her room. She drank, mostly, in the privacy of her
bedroom in the dead of the night.
Her tears fall as easily as raindrops during a thunder
storm and soon she is sobbing uncontrollably. Her loud sobs vibrate out from her
and seems to echo around the room. All the pain and misery she had artfully
hidden, ignored, disguised and postponed with alcohol surfaced and she cried
her heart out.
“Jael? What’s going on?”
“Hey.
Wh- Shit! Jael! You guys! Get up!”
“What
happened?!”
Her cries awake her best friends sleeping in her room; it
was a slumber party.
“Dammit!
How could this have happened?” she heard someone curse under her breath. “Jael,
why didn’t you say something?”
She feels a cold, wet towel wrap around her bleeding
wrist and one of her friend, she is crying too hard to know who, wrapped Jael
tightly in her arms.
“It’s
ok, Jael. We’re here. You’re going to be ok,” a voice floats into her head. She
couldn’t tell if it was one of her friends or just a part of her that spoke.
“You
don’t have to do this alone,” another chimes in.
Surrounded by her friends, finally feeling safe for the
first time in ages, she closes her eyes and falls into a peaceful slumber.
