She holds a silver blade to her wrist, captivated by the way it seems to be winking up at her. Her breathing is heavy and she can feel her heart beat throughout her whole body without trying.
There was a slight buzzing in Jael's head. The room feels too hot even though the air conditioner is on. Jael could feel herself swaying a bit every now and then as if some invisible force was rocking her.
"Fuck the world," she thinks, her mind was numbed by alcohol and her heart shattered by pain. Tears spring to her eyes.
She drops the blade and takes another gulp of alcohol. It burns as she swallows and a fiery inferno explodes within her. At first, Jael had to dilute the rum in other drinks to hide its taste 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 who's life suddenly plunged, Jael wonders, "So why am I so messed up? How did I lose control? I can’t. I can’t do this anymore."
Inside her, her conscience was trying desperately to surface, to spread logic and reason but its efforts were doused by the effects of alcohol like fire to water. 'Romans 12:21, 1 Corinthians 10:13, Deuteronomy 8:16, Leviticus 26:11-12.' Scriptures recite in her mind but she has no idea what they were or what they meant. They keep coming and repeat themselves until finally the words just seem to fade 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 icy water. Jael presses 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 up the last of the rum. Slowly, carefully and with the concentration of a bomb squad, she finally manages to pick up the small 20 cents blade.
Jael eyes the piece of sharp metal in her hand like it is a new toy she had always wanted, as if it held untold wonders that could bring her joy. Perhaps it could. Jael takes a deep breath and pulls the blade across her right arm. 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 tilt slightly back, Jael scored the blade across her arm again. She holds in her breath. It feels as if she is opening a vent, allowing some of the tremendous pressure to ease. She had almost forgotten how good it felt.
She watches with satisfaction as more blood appeared. Jael feels an immense relief, as if it was her pain, not blood, that is flowing freely out of her. She cut a line parallel to the others and sighed. She hurt so much inside that the pain outside seemed to take her mind of everything else.
Jael watches as her blood slowly starts flowing along her arm. The whole 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 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 sound as it hits the ground or maybe it is in her imagination. Her system was so concentrated with alcohol nothing at all made 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 towards her drinking that she had promised to stop. It took awhile 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.
That promise lasted two months until her avalanche of unknown alien emotions started up again and seemed to suppress even the ease to breathe.
“I promised,” she whispers tearfully. It had broken her heart when she realized how much her friends cared about her and how much she had let them down but here she was, breaking their trust and hopes for her again. She had betrayed them.
Suddenly, Jael is repulsed by the sight of her bleeding arm. “I promised. I said I wouldn’t get addicted again.” Tears appear and she starts rocking herself back and forth, cradling her bloody wrist.
It had been so easy to hide her renewed addiction. She learned never to drink too much when she couldn’t hide the redness of her face. She snuck out the alcohol in small amounts from her parents’ liquor cabinet and stored them in small bottles hidden carefully in 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 seem to echo around her room. All the pain and misery she had hidden, ignored and postponed with alcohol surfaced and she cries 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, holds Jael 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.
0 comments:
Post a Comment